Review: English First is an extremely large company that has been around for a long time in both physical and virtual format. You must be a native English teacher with a university degree. They are looking for teachers with past teaching experience, but it is not required. If you have a TEFL certificate that will help and you can become certified while on the job as an option. Each of the lessons is 20-45 minutes and are held on their own custom platform with the lessons provided. Group lessons range from 5-6 students and they also offer one-on-one lessons. After each lesson, you will provide written feedback. Most students are adults between 24 and 50 years of age and are typically university students or business professionals.
Job Overview for English First: | |
Pay Rate per Hour: Minimum: $10 | Class Size: |
Student Ages: | Class Schedule: |
Requirements: | |
Accent(s): Native North American | Degree Required: |
Certification:Yes | Years Experience: |
Min Hours Week: | Internet Speed(Mbps): Min Uploading: MB/s |
Here are some videos of the classroom environment:
Here is a team of EF YouTubers travelling around the world:
BRING LANGUAGE TO LIFE
WHO ARE WE LOOKING FOR?
We look for teachers who have strong communication skills, high energy and great interpersonal skills. We also look for candidates who are customer-oriented and adaptable in an online teaching environment.
REQUIREMENTS
Teachers are required to be native English speakers and should have a university degree, computer proficiency and an engaging online presence. Past teaching experience is a plus, but not required. A TEFL certificate can be earned on the job.
WHERE DO WE TEACH FROM?
Our teachers work in teaching centers in many parts of the world, including online centers located in Bali, Johannesburg, Santiago and Shanghai. Teachers in the US and in many other countries have the opportunity to work from home, making this a great freelance opportunity for graduate students, parents and English-speaking expats living abroad.
ABOUT TEACHING ENGLISH ONLINE
THE ESSENTIALS
Our online English lessons range from 20-45 minutes in length and are delivered on our custom platform using innovative, EF-developed lesson content. An average group lesson has 5-6 students, but we also offer private, one-on-one lessons.
Teachers are provided with access to supplementary materials for lesson preparation and are also able to create custom content to best match their student’s interests and needs when requested. After each lesson, teachers provide students with written feedback on their performance.
PROFILE OF OUR TEACHERS
Our teachers are tech-savvy and comfortable using online platforms. Their engaging and positive online presence makes our virtual classrooms come alive, thereby motivating students to improve their English and move one step closer to achieving their career and educational goals.
All of our teachers are passionate about education and language, and our freelance centers are a perfect fit for candidates looking for a flexible schedule and the ability to work from home.
TEACHER SUPPORT AND DEVELOPMENT
EF online teachers have the opportunity to participate in ongoing certification and professional development courses that offer a strong foundation for future career growth in both teaching and education management. Our teachers also have access to an online community that allows them to share tips and best practices.
PROFILE OF OUR STUDENTS
Our students come from all corners of the globe. They might be University students or business professionals who have set personal goals to improve their English. Or, they may be corporate customers whose employers are sponsoring their study at EF. Almost all of our students are adults between 24 and 50 years old.
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OK everyone, I thought I would post a review about EF. Now before I begin this very long and honest review I am going to begin by saying that I don’t want you to apply and use me as a referral. The simple truth is that I don’t know you and as such I don’t know who I am attaching my name to. So please apply with the link below knowing I won’t be asking nor receiving a single dime.
Pros:
EF is worldwide based and has over 10000 registered teachers on its books at any one time. The students are literally worldwide and are most certainly adults or above 16 years old.
The required minimum hours are 60 teaching hours per month. As a new recruit you will be expected to cover some weekend hours during your 3 month trial period. There are no maximum hours that you can teach. So, if you are so inclined you could book 10 a day 7 days a week if they are available of course.
It is worth noting the following before many jump down my throat. EF has the following teams.
1) Part time: These are for people who need the flexibility of working when they can.
2) Weekend team, these include new starters but again with those that have limited time to teach or teach in a school during the week.
3) Full Time, This is where you can make the money. You have first take on the hours which are released on a Thursday at around 3 pm Thai time. Many of these people treat this as their only job so full time suits them. Note: You have to reach and maintain the very highest level of exit scores to stay within this group or you will be moved to part time. The hours are released on a Friday at around 5 pm for all other groups.
I would say that you should be able to earn as much or as little as you want with EF most of the time but a degree of flexibility is required from you to fill those hours.
Classes:
They have two types of classes. The first being Group Classes. These are set at Beginner through to Advanced. You may choose the class level but always be prepared for that to change when the class opens. Private Classes: These are slightly shorter and can take two forms. The first being the pre selected classes or something that the students wish to study or talk about. The aim is to get as many regular clients as you can thus boosting your hours. There is zero pressure for you to do this but quite often your privates will come from the group lessons and they have booked you because they liked your style of teaching.
Good points: Group lessons happen and usually have no more than 6 students in each class at any time. The only bad point I can think of is to mention the no speakers. These students are often for whatever reason refusing to speak. It could be that they are new to the platform or just don’t wish to engage. I simply type a simple welcome message and also say hi to them and move on with the class.
Bad Points: You may get students who have technical issues with mics and speakers. These are often new students who haven’t been trained properly or haven’t understood the technology. As mentioned above. You will also have the odd class where students won’t speak. There is simply nothing you can do about this so don’t stress about it, just go and make a coffee.
I have worked for EF for 3 years and I am really happy with them. The backup service is really good and if you follow procedure they will back you up in a dispute. The main thing is to take a screen shot of each class and you have all the proof you need in case of any technical issues that are not your fault. If you fail to do this you will usually lose any claim to get paid. The pay starts at $10 for the first quarter and rises by an extra $1 dollar till you reach $12, after this it is a year increase to a maximum $15. This does not include the rate for multi lingual teachers. They receive an extra $2 per class. So there you have it. My honest and frank review of EF. They may not pay the best rates but given their size they can give you your desired hours and the support is with native speakers. As I said, I am not looking to gain from your application so please don’t use me as a referral, just apply and good luck. You do need to be a degree holder and have a TEFL certificate. Regarding native and non-native. I know that the key thing here is your accent. If you are a non-native but speak in a clear manner you will be fine. The only area restriction that I am aware of is that they don’t take teachers from Vietnam, Cambodia or the Philippines. This is due to both the low quality internet and electricity blackouts. Not my decision so don’t moan and groan at me.
Chan Chan asked me if I could give some information about working for EF Education First so here goes. I’m only in my 3rd month.
Flexible timetable:
They give me a lot of flexibility re. timetabling and holidays. I basically set the timetable I want each week. I had to refuse an offer with DadaABC (a far better paying offer) because they would have fined me 10% of my salary and not guaranteed me students because of holiday time. I had already organised and paid for the holidays before getting the DadaABC offer otherwise I would have definitely accepted it over the EF one.
Class planning and students:
There is very little planning and you have paid time to do after class reports. Group classes are 45 minutes and you are paid for one hour so you have 15 minutes to do the report. When you have experience you can very easily do the report in 15 minutes or less. Private lesson are 40 minutes with 20 minutes paid reporting time. The reports for the 40 minute classes are very long but with experience you can get them done in 20-25 minutes. Short private lessons are 20 minutes with 10 minutes reporting time (short, simple report).
If a student doesn’t turn up for a private class you get paid for your wait time (20%) but have to make up the rest by doing writing corrections which are pretty tedious and often the corresponding writing corrections take me much longer than the original class time. I guess with practice it will get much faster.
Students are generally very nice and I enjoy the classes, but there are some issues with silent students (who just sit in group classes to make up time) and students being placed in completely the wrong levels.
Pay and allocated lessons:
A big negative is the pay – 10USD during the probation period — too low for someone with experience and qualifications. It rises to 11USD after that and rises again after a year with them. It’s the main thing that might make me start to look elsewhere. Also, I’m sometimes only being allocated 60-70% of my available hours. Other times I am allocated 100% so it does balance out.
Overall I like the company, have had great communication with them and generally have nice students but the pay is low.